I am a Ph.D. student in the History Department, with research interests in the cultural and social history of the long 19th century, the history of capitalism, the history of information, and the history of technology.

My dissertation, “Private Credit, Public Debt: A Global History of Brazil’s and Argentina’s Integration into International Financial Markets, 1852–1914,” examines how newly independent nation-states in the region changed from economic pariahs to massive debtors throughout the course of the 19th century. My research shows that intermediaries – diplomats, journalists, bankers, entrepreneurs, and the occasional opportunist – were crucial in this process as they helped reduce transaction costs in an imperfectly integrated world and thus played a vital role in the functioning of markets. Moreover, intermediaries (embedded in the financial and social networks that linked Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, London, and Paris) produced cultural commensurability, a form of financial labor that crucially fostered the first wave of economic globalization. In doing so, they boosted the credibility of non-European cultures by interpreting the untold rules and norms of contemporary cultures of credibility. Finally, intermediaries helped accelerate the development of public debt as a state technology in Latin America during the second half of the 19th century.

Over the last years, I have conducted multi-archival research in the United Kingdom, the United States, Chile, Brazil, Argentina, and France.

I graduated summa cum laude in History from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. I also hold a M.A. in International Relations from the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro.